I ran into Winnipeg Jets chairman Mark Chipman on a flight to Minneapolis on Monday and he said exactly what I was thinking.

If the Jets play the way they did the last two games, they are going to be awfully tough for any team to beat.

That includes the Nashville Predators, who appear to be the class of the NHL’s Western Conference right now.

The Jets played a terrific brand of hockey in the back-to-back games on the weekend against the powerful St. Louis Blues.

They generated an impressive 94 shots on goal in the two games, against a team that averaged fewer than 29 shots against per game and is one of the stingiest defensive squads in the game.

They outplayed St. Louis for 120 minutes. The only St. Louis player they weren’t better than was goaltender Carter Hutton, who stopped 48 shots in a 2-0 St. Louis win on Saturday.

The Jets did not get discouraged however and came out with the same intensity, the same physicality and the same ability to generate offensive chances, while skating to 4-0 win on Sunday.

Led by impressive sophomore defenceman Josh Morrissey — who did his best Duncan Keith impression Sunday by making several outstanding defensive plays, laying out big hits, scoring a goal and adding an assist — the Jets showed the Blues they are legitimate contenders for top spot in the wildly competitive Central Division.

It would be almost impossible for any team to play that way for 82 games but the Jets have already shown an ability to do it relatively consistently.

Which brings us back to Tuesday’s game against the Predators, a team that had a consistent enough game to get all the way to the Stanley Cup final last spring.

They’ve been stellar again this year and were the better team when the Jets visited Nashville last month.

Like the Blues, the Preds are a team the Jets are going to have to beat to make any noise in the standings and during the playoffs. Nashville is tops in the conference with 46 points and the Jets sit just three points back.

The Jets come into Nashville on a cold streak on the road. The Jets are 0-4-2 in their last six road games, have been outscored 24-10 over that span and they’ve given up at least three goals in five of the six games. Their power play over the six games was a woeful 2-for-25 (8%) and their penalty kill just 17-for-25 (68%).

Those numbers won’t do if the Jets are going to start picking up points away from home again.

With a 6-3-1 record against the Central Division, the Jets are holding their own but as evidenced by the intensity of the St. Louis games, these games mean more than others.

The combination of ferocious forechecking, solid defensive play and good goaltending — along with an elite home-ice power play — has made them something special to watch and helped them to a record that is nine games over NHL .500 (19-10-5).

And yet they’re only a few losses away from being close to the playoff line.

Wins on the road and within the division will go a long way toward separating the Jets from then chasing pack.

What has held them back from doing that so far has been a series of lapses.

When they’ve had off nights, they’ve really been off. In their 10 losses this season, the Jets have been outscored 50-18. By contrast, in their 19 wins, they’ve outscored the opposition 83-28.

Some of the games were closer than the score indicated, but basically, for the most part the Jets either win big, or they lose big this season.

Not one of the outright losses was decided by a single goal and only three of them were decided by as few as two goals. Only four of their wins have been decided by one goal.

Almost all of their one-goal games have gone to overtime and you can’t help notice how much better their record would look if they weren’t 0-5 in gimmicky 3-on-3 extra time.

So here’s the checklist for a team that has done many things right to this point in the season:

Win a few more games on the road, win in the division and cut out the lapse games — after Christmas those will become more and more costly. Oh, and maybe pop in an overtime goal or two.

After Nashville, the Jets will have a couple more tough matchups — against the Bruins in Boston on Thursday and in Brooklyn against Andrew Ladd and the New York Islanders on Saturday afternoon.

A couple of wins in the three games would sure look good heading into the short Christmas break.

Keep playing the way they did on Saturday and Sunday and it’s going to be a very happy holiday.

This Week's Flyers

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